DOCSLIB.ORG

Coastal Heritage, Vol 14 #4, Spring 2000

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Coastal Heritage, Vol 14 #4, Spring 2000 CCOASTALOASTAL HERITAGEERITAGE HVOLUME 14, NUMBER 4 SPRING 2000 Living Soul OF Gullah SPRING 2000 • 1 CONTENTS 3 Coastal Heritage is a quarterly publication of the S.C. Sea Grant Consortium, a university- LIVING SOUL OF GULLAH based network supporting research, education, Spawned by Africa and Europe, by slavery and isolation, and outreach to conserve coastal resources and the Gullah culture is fading into the modern world. enhance economic opportunity for the people of South Carolina. Comments regarding this or future issues of Coastal Heritage are welcomed. Subscriptions are free upon request 13 by contacting: SOUTHERN BLEND S.C. Sea Grant Consortium 287 Meeting Street Charleston, S.C. 29401 phone: (843) 727-2078 e-mail: [email protected] Executive Director ON THE COVER M. Richard DeVoe Rev. LuElla Smith offers testimony about her Christian faith at Echo House, a Director of Communications community center in North Charleston.Today, Gullah traditions can be found Linda Blackwell in African-American religious practices, such as testimonies, syncopated Editor clapping, and call-and-response. John H. Tibbetts PHOTO/WADE SPEES Art Director Patty Snow Contributing Writer Peg Alford � Board of Directors The Consortium’s Board of Directors is composed of the chief executive officers of its member institutions: Dr. Leroy Davis, Sr., Chair President, S.C. State University James F. Barker President, Clemson University Dr. Raymond Greenberg President, Medical University of South Carolina Major General John S. Grinalds President, The Citadel Dr. Ronald R. Ingle President, Coastal Carolina University Dr. John M. Palms A ROAD LESS TRAVELED. Two boys stand on a country road in President, University of South Carolina Lowcountry South Carolina in the 1910s. Only a few generations ago, the Gullah culture thrived along isolated stretches of the coast. PHOTO/COLLECTIONS OF Judge Alex Sanders THE SOUTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL SOCIETY. President, University of Charleston, S.C. Dr. Paul A. Sandifer Executive Director S.C. Department of Natural Resources 2 • COASTAL HERITAGE LIVING SOUL OF GULLAH By John H. Tibbetts Spawned by Africa and Europe, by slavery and isolation, the Gullah culture is fading into the modern world. CASTING THE WATERS. As Sam Moultrie, Sr., guides a flat-bottomed boat he built by hand, Sam R. Brown, Jr., casts a net into a St. Helena Island creek. For generations, Gullah people have supplemented their diet and income by shrimping, crabbing, and fishing. PHOTO/WADE SPEES. t’s the oldest American story, told countless times. The Gullah people are descendants of various African For generations, an ethnic or religious clan, tightly ethnic groups who were forced together on South Carolina I knit by language and religion, huddles in a New plantations. When Ashantis, Fantes, Fulas, Ibos, World rural enclave or urban ghetto, enduring prejudice Mandingos, Yorubas, the Bakongo cultures, and other and poverty. Then abruptly ancient bonds fray. Strangers peoples arrived as slaves in America, they established a move in and disrupt local traditions, elders complain creole language—Gullah—from English and African about their heritage’s neglect and exploitation by sources. outsiders, while young people leave home in droves to The vocabulary of every creole language is Euro- gain better jobs and education. pean—English, French, Spanish, Dutch, or Portuguese. It’s the immigrant story of assimilation and loss, told The slaveholders “had to communicate with the slaves, so by Irish Catholics in Boston, Russian Jews in New York, they made sure the slaves used European words,” notes and Chinese Buddhists in San Francisco. But over the Philip D. Morgan, historian at the College of William & last 50 years, groups with centuries-old roots in America Mary. In the English colonies of North America, slaves also have been dragged into the mainstream, including used the English-based Gullah language to communicate the Cajuns in Louisiana, highlanders in Appalachia, with one another. Native Americans in every state, and the Gullah people Yet down through centuries, the Gullah people of coastal South Carolina. managed to retain extensive African sources in their SPRING 2000 • 3 speech and folklore. The grammar of Today, many think of South Highways and condos and golf Gullah is African, and many aspects Carolina’s Gullah people as the black courses and hotels replaced “praise of Gullah culture—religious beliefs, residents of James, Johns, houses” and graveyards and farms. arts and crafts, stories, songs, and Wadmalaw, Edisto, St. Helena, and Many sea-island people sold their proverbs—were derived from African Hilton Head islands. But the classic property and moved away. In some sources. The Gullah people have Gullah culture actually existed on cases they were forced to sell their preserved more of their African the mainland tidal area, along rivers land, unable to afford the rising taxes cultural history than any other large for 30 miles inland, known as the spawned by resort and suburban group of blacks in the United States, “rice coast,” says Charles Joyner, development. noted William S. Pollitzer, professor historian at Coastal Carolina Like all oral societies, Gullah is emeritus of anatomy and anthropol­ University. The rice coast and the fragile. Without a written language, ogy at the University Gullah culture the passing of knowledge within a of North Carolina at extended south from culture can quickly break down. In Chapel Hill, in a 1999 Winyah Bay near many of today’s endangered oral book. “So many Georgetown cultures, children are not interested Africanisms survived through Georgia in learning the old ways, which in Gullah culture,” into northern disappear as elders, the repositories says Pollitzer. To some Florida. Even today, of knowledge, die out. An oral degree, “it was a re­ says Joyner, the culture is transmitted primarily creation of Africa Gullah culture may through families, and when there is a within the New remain as strong on break—even of just 30 years or so— World.” the mainland as on the loss often cannot be regained. The Gullah the sea islands. “For years, we were told that our language is unique, After the Civil language is broken,” says Marquetta the only lasting War, when slaves L. Goodwine, founder of the Gullah/ English-based creole were emancipated, Geechee Sea Island Coalition based in North America. many Gullah people on St. Helena Island. “A generation “Nothing like it A Lowcountry field hand in the 1910s. began to assimilate of people were told, ‘You’ll never get survives in other PHOTO/COLLECTIONS OF THE SOUTH CAROLINA into southern black through life talking like that.’” City HISTORICAL SOCIETY. places” in the United society. During the blacks often sought to distinguish States, says Morgan. “Similar creole next century, large numbers of themselves from the Gullah speakers languages may have been spoken Gullah people left rural areas for they regarded as inferior. Goodwine outside of coastal South Carolina (in Savannah and Charleston, or they remembers, “Anybody living in town the slavery era), but they disappeared became part of the great migration of would say, ‘I’m not Gullah; I’m not quickly. By the early 19th century, blacks north to cities on the eastern from the island.’” there was little evidence that other seaboard, especially Philadelphia and creole languages existed in the New York City. A WORLD APART Chesapeake region and North Yet by the end of the Second Carolina,” where slaves adapted to World War, many Gullah people still Two lucrative crops—rice and Standard English. stayed home in rural areas along the sea-island cotton—were the driving Gullah culture thrived in places coast. “They maintained a separate­ forces behind the creation of Gullah with a significant black majority. ness,” says Lawrence Rowland, culture. On most of the large plantations in historian at the University of South Within the first decade after coastal South Carolina, slaves Carolina-Beaufort. “Gullah people Charles Town’s founding in 1670, greatly outnumbered whites. In All were marginalized economically and settlers had already brought slaves Saints Parish, between the socially.” with them from the West Indies. In Waccamaw River and the Atlantic Modern influences diluted the the first few years of the Carolina Ocean, there were nine African- language, and many African words settlement, between one-fourth and Americans to every one white were lost, replaced by Standard one-third of the colony’s population person in 1860, for example. Even English. Starting in the 1950s, resort were Africans, according to Peter the smallest rice plantation in the development, racial integration, the H. Wood, University of North parish had nearly 100 slaves, and civil rights movement, and economic Carolina at Chapel Hill historian, the largest plantation had more opportunities transformed the coast in a 1974 book. At first, slaves than 1,100. and hastened Gullah’s decline. worked alongside their owners, 4 • COASTAL HERITAGE NET PROFIT. Luke Smalls, a retiree on St. Helena Island, sews a net to catch shrimp, fish, and crabs. When he was a boy, his uncle taught him how. “In those days, the only way you could get a net was to sew one. If I do it steadily, I can make a net in three or four weeks. But many young people aren’t interested in learning.They can make money at things that take less time.” PHOTO/WADE SPEES SPRING 2000 • 5 struggling to survive on the heavily black majority increasingly lived within timbered, swampy land. their creole world. Early on, the English settlers searched Over nearly 150 years—from 1670 to for a staple crop they could export, 1808—at least 120,000 Africans were planting cotton, indigo, ginger, grapes, and hauled legally into Charleston, the primary olives—without much success. Settlers slave-trading port for the southern Atlantic exported wood products to other colonies, seaboard. But many traders looked for but their immediate economic salvation opportunities to move slaves illegally or off Assimilating was in raising livestock for sale overseas.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Heirs Property Rights in Family and in Law
    disClosure: A Journal of Social Theory Volume 20 Family Sex Law Article 14 4-2011 Wigfall v. Mobley et al.: Heirs Property Rights in Family and in Law Brian Grabbatin University of Kentucky Jennie L. Stephens Center for Heirs’ Property Preservation DOI: https://doi.org/10.13023/disclosure.20.14 Follow this and additional works at: https://uknowledge.uky.edu/disclosure Part of the Law Commons, and the Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License. Recommended Citation Grabbatin, Brian and Stephens, Jennie L. (2011) "Wigfall v. Mobley et al.: Heirs Property Rights in Family and in Law," disClosure: A Journal of Social Theory: Vol. 20 , Article 14. DOI: https://doi.org/10.13023/disclosure.20.14 Available at: https://uknowledge.uky.edu/disclosure/vol20/iss1/14 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by disClosure: A Journal of Social Theory. Questions about the journal can be sent to [email protected] Grabbatin and Stephens Brian Grabbatin eviction, however, he shared the pain of watching his family members lose Jennie 1. Stephens their homes, knowing that his time on the land was also coming to a close. When asked about the impending eviction he told reporters, "I feel the loss in my bones .. .! feel like part of my body is gone, but I'm still living" Wigfall v. Mobleyet al.: (Bartelme 2000, I-A). Heirs' Property Rights in The displacement described above exposes the powerlessness and Family and in Law vulnerability of African American heirs' property owners.
    [Show full text]
  • This Study Was Based on the Premise That the Igbos' Concept of Flight Was Not Only
    ABSTRACT AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDIES THOMAS, DARLENE D. B.A. LIMESTONE COLLEGE, 2000 FLIGHT: AN EPIC JOURNEY IN THE LEGEND OF THE FLYING AFRICANS Committee Chair: Josephine Bradley, Ph.D. Thesis dated May 2015 This study examines the term flight, as both motif and as consciousness in the legend of the flying Africans, and the cosmological differences as represented in four texts: Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon, Paula Marshall's Praisesong for the Widow, Ralph Ellison's Flying Home, and Octavia Butler's Kindred. Flight is measured in terms of recurring patterns found within the texts and their meanings given by the authors. The problem of this research stems from the issue that the Gullah, direct descendents of the flying Africans (Igbos) along the Coastal Sea Islands of the United States, have upheld an age hierarchy of secrecy such that there is limited research in the area of flight, allowing this group to maintain a unique African identity for over 200 years. This study was based on the premise that the Igbos' concept of flight was not only a survival mechanism but also a way to form community and identity and to keep the memories of their ancestors alive. This idea is called epic memory, that which has to be pieced together in order for the person to be made whole. An intertextual historiography analysis approach was utilized as the methodology to better understand the life and culture of the Gullah and Igbos. Karla F. C. Holloway argues that revision, (re)membrance, and recursion are always present when analyzing "speakerly texts." The researcher found that numerous recurring patterns within the selected texts began to form meaning around beliefs and myth within culture remembered during epic events.
    [Show full text]
  • Wees Gonna Tell It Like We Know It Tuh Be: Coded Language in the Works of Julia Peterkin and Gloria Naylor
    Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University English Theses Department of English 8-21-2008 Wees Gonna Tell It Like We Know It Tuh Be: Coded Language in the Works of Julia Peterkin and Gloria Naylor Crystal Margie Hills Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/english_theses Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Hills, Crystal Margie, "Wees Gonna Tell It Like We Know It Tuh Be: Coded Language in the Works of Julia Peterkin and Gloria Naylor." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2008. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/english_theses/45 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of English at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in English Theses by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WEES GONNA TELL IT LIKE WE KNOW IT TUH BE: CODED LANGUAGE IN THE WORKS OF JULIA PETERKIN AND GLORIA NAYLOR by CRYSTAL MARGIE HILLS ABSTRACT This study employs African American literary criticism and critical discourse analysis to evaluate Julia Peterkin's Scarlet Sister Mary (1928) and Gloria Naylor's Mama Day (1988). These women write stories of African American life on the Sea Islands through different prisms that evoke cultural memory within and outside the texts. Peterkin, a white Southerner, writes as an "onlooker" and “pioneer” of fictional Gullah culture; Naylor, a black Northerner by birth, writes as an "outsider" to Gullah culture, although a veteran of African American Southern heritage. The authors' hybridity produce different literary voices.
    [Show full text]
  • Gullah Womanism in the Creative Works of African American Women
    i OOMAN’S WUK: GULLAH WOMANISM IN THE CREATIVE WORKS OF AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMEN by JUDITH LYNN STRATHEARN B. S. Rochester Institute of Technology, 1993 B.A., Metropolitan State College of Denver, 2004 M.A., University of Colorado at Boulder, 2008 A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Colorado in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of English 2017 ii This dissertation entitled: Ooman’s Wuk: Gullah Womanism in the Creative Works of African American Women written by Judith Lynn Strathearn has been approved for the Department of English Adam F. Bradley (Committee Chair) Michael J. Preston (Committee Member) Date The final copy of this thesis has been examined by the signatories, and we find that both the content and the form meet acceptable presentation standards of scholarly work in the above mentioned discipline. iii ABSTRACT Strathearn, Judith Lynn (Ph.D., English) Ooman’s Wuk: Gullah Womanism in the Creative Works of African American Women Dissertation directed by Associate Professor Adam F. Bradley “Ooman’s Wuk: Gullah Womanism in the Creative Works of African American Women” investigates Gullah history and culture as a usable past for modern African American female artists. This project explores the history of rice production and the vital but under-discussed role of women that led to the African retentions still at work on the Sea Islands of South Carolina and Georgia. By exploring the often disavowed female roles, this dissertation argues that once acknowledged, the Gullah woman’s role as ‘keepa a da kulca’ formulates a Gullah womanism or a form of cultural and community activism that is found in the daily lives of the female descendants of Africans living on the Sea Islands.
    [Show full text]
  • The Gullah People, Justice, and the Land on Hilton Head Island: a Historical Perspective
    The Gullah People, Justice, and the Land on Hilton Head Island: A Historical Perspective Dominique T. Hazzard Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Prerequisite for Honors in Environmental Studies Wellesley College April 2012 2 Table of Contents Acknowledgements..........................................................................................................................4 Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................5 1. The Nexus of History and Environmental Justice.......................................................................7 2. Introduction to Gullah People and the Land………………......................................................21 3. Acquisition, Development, and Transformation of Community on Hilton Head......................41 4. Erosion of Community Health and the Gullah-Geechee Movement.........................................64 5. Epilogue.....................................................................................................................................88 Bibliography..................................................................................................................................93 3 Acknowledgements I would like to thank my advisor Professor James Turner for his infinite patience, guidance, and support, and for consistently having faith in me over the past four years. Likewise, I am grateful to my committee members Professors Elizabeth DeSombre, Ryan Quintana, and Marcy Thomas for
    [Show full text]
  • The Gullah People, Justice, and the Land on Hilton Head Island: a Historical Perspective
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Wellesley College Wellesley College Wellesley College Digital Scholarship and Archive Honors Thesis Collection 2012 The ulG lah People, Justice, and the Land on Hilton Head Island: A Historical Perspective Dominique T. Hazzard Wellesley College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.wellesley.edu/thesiscollection Recommended Citation Hazzard, Dominique T., "The ulG lah People, Justice, and the Land on Hilton Head Island: A Historical Perspective" (2012). Honors Thesis Collection. 60. https://repository.wellesley.edu/thesiscollection/60 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Wellesley College Digital Scholarship and Archive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Thesis Collection by an authorized administrator of Wellesley College Digital Scholarship and Archive. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Gullah People, Justice, and the Land on Hilton Head Island: A Historical Perspective Dominique T. Hazzard Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Prerequisite for Honors in Environmental Studies Wellesley College April 2012 2 Table of Contents Acknowledgements..........................................................................................................................4 Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................5 1. The Nexus of History and Environmental
    [Show full text]
  • Yaw Owusu Shangofemi: an African-American's
    YAW OWUSU SHANGOFEMI: AN AFRICAN-AMERICAN’S BLACKSMITHING CAREER IN CONTEXT By JODY NICOLE BERMAN A THESIS PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2005 Copyright 2005 by Jody Nicole Berman This document is dedicated to the graduate students of the University of Florida. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS As anyone who has written a thesis or dissertation knows, the people who help alleviate a lonely and often arduous undertaking deserve special gratitude. I would like to thank Yaw Owusu Shangofemi for allowing me to document his blacksmithing career. His personhood has been a source of great inspiration and has given me insight into the African-American blacksmithing tradition of Charleston, South Carolina. I thank Ade Ofunniyin who has been the facilitator of much of my research. His vast experience within the Yoruba culture and religion has served as a profound resource to my education and his dedicated friendship is greatly appreciated. I owe my greatest intellectual debt to Dr. Robin Poynor who has tirelessly supported my educational goals throughout my graduate and undergraduate career. He has continually made himself available to me, has read through countless versions of the manuscript, provided detailed and skillful criticisms, and has supported this endeavor from start to finish. I would like to thank my colleagues in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Florida, particularly Brenna Braley and Joanne Ihas. They have been a source of boisterous laughter and continuous commiseration throughout this academic process.
    [Show full text]
  • A Rhetorical Analysis of the 2000 National Park Service Low Country Gullah Culture Special Resource Study
    Unless God Take My Life, I’m Going To Be At Those Meetings: A Rhetorical Analysis of the 2000 National Park Service Low Country Gullah Culture Special Resource Study. by Michael Kenneth Davis (Under the direction of Edward Panetta) Abstract Public meetings have become a means of expanding the reach of debate and deliberation to include the perspectives of a variety of community members. This project examines to what extent a series of meeting held by the National Park Service in 2000 are able to include the perspectives of a marginalized group, the Gullah of Georgia and South Carolina. The focus on this study is on the ways that the Gullah are both able to use the meetings to have their voices heard and how meeting administrators seek to contain public calls for empowerment. Index words: Public meetings, Gullah, Narrative, Public deliberation, South Carolina, Georgia, National Park Service Unless God Take My Life, I’m Going To Be At Those Meetings: A Rhetorical Analysis of the 2000 National Park Service Low Country Gullah Culture Special Resource Study. by Michael Kenneth Davis B.S., Syracuse University, 1995 M.A., Syracuse University, 1998 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy Athens, Georgia 2005 °c 2005 Michael Kenneth Davis All Rights Reserved Unless God Take My Life, I’m Going To Be At Those Meetings: A Rhetorical Analysis of the 2000 National Park Service Low Country Gullah Culture Special Resource Study. by Michael Kenneth Davis Approved: Major Professor: Edward Panetta Committee: Thomas Lessl John Murphy Celeste Condit Chana Kai Lee Electronic Version Approved: Maureen Grasso Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia December 2005 Dedication To my mother, who instilled in me from an early age a love of learning and encouraged me to love with all my heart.
    [Show full text]
  • IS ECOTOURISM a VIABLE SOLUTION? by SARA MAE TYLER
    MAINTAINING THE GULLAH HISTORY, HERITAGE, AND CULTURE: IS ECOTOURISM A VIABLE SOLUTION? by SARA MAE TYLER (Under the Direction of Hilda Kurtz) ABSTRACT This thesis evaluates the potential of ecotourism as an alternative form of development for a population significantly impacted by more traditional forms of mass tourism. The focus is on a community on St. Helena Island in South Carolina, of which a large portion is the Gullah. The Gullah are descendents of slaves from Western Africa who have been able to maintain their language, religious beliefs, rituals, foods, music, and crafts that distinctly connect them to their African roots. Ecotourism has often been utilized in the developing world to improve the ecological, economic, and cultural situation of indigenous communities, yet it can also be appropriate within the developed world. Theoretical considerations include the exploration of when ecotourism may or may not be viable depending on local contextual factors. Pertinent ethical considerations include whether it is moral to market a culture, and if tourism is simply artificial maintenance of a dying culture. INDEX WORDS: Ecotourism, Gullah, Sea Islands, St. Helena Island MAINTAINING THE GULLAH HISTORY, HERITAGE, AND CULTURE: IS ECOTOURISM A VIABLE SOLUTION? by SARA MAE TYLER B.S., Northern Michigan University, 2001 A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree MASTER OF SCIENCE ATHENS, GEORGIA 2003 ©2003 Sara M. Tyler All Rights Reserved MAINTAINING THE GULLAH HISTORY, HERITAGE, AND CULTURE: IS ECOTOURISM A VIABLE SOLUTION? by SARA MAE TYLER Major Professor: Hilda Kurtz Committee: Ikubolejah Logan Michael Tarrant Electronic Version Approved: Dr.
    [Show full text]
  • EPISODE 1 Transcript
    THERE IS A RIVER Produced, Directed, and Written by W. Noland Walker Associate Producer: Julia Elliott NARRATOR: The South Carolina coast: The point of entry for one fifth of all the Africans who were enslaved in North America. In large part, the record of their individual lives is lost. But there is much to be learned about who these women and men were and what they believed in through the lives that their descendants lead today. On these shores, the roots of the African American spiritual experience. run deep. ART JONES: These were really deeply spiritual people who had centuries of spirituality behind them, and very long established traditions. And even though some of the specific memories of those religious practices were wiped out as families were traded on the auction block and so on, they still had a very deep spiritual consciousness and spiritual sensibility. NARRATOR: Through the middle passage, sale on the auction block, and endless back breaking labor black people have called upon a spiritual legacy that defiantly proclaims: “I am a child of God, a servant of Allah, a child of Shango, a child of Oshun no matter what anyone does to me.” RACHEL HARDING: It's a way of saying that as a human being I have a right to joy, I have a right to music, I have a right to story and I have a right to the tree of life. NARRATOR: Present in each generation was the faith that a better day would come – that God would send deliverance. But deliverance did not come overnight.
    [Show full text]
  • Coastal Heritage VOLUME 22, NUMBER 3 WINTER 2008
    COASTAL HERITAGE VOLUME 22, NUMBER 3 WINTER 2008 Breaking THE CHAINS THE END OF THE TRANSATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE WINTER 2008 • CONTENTS 3 BREAKING THE CHAINS: THE END OF THE TRANSATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE Two hundred years ago, abolitionists gained their first victory in the long struggle to abolish the ownership of human beings. This year, the lowcountry commemorates the anniversary of that initial victory. 5 Coastal Heritage is a quarterly publication of the S.C. Sea Grant Consortium, a university- SOUTH CAROLINA’S SLAVE TRADE based network supporting research, education, The 1808 ban on slave imports to the United States had unintended and outreach to conserve coastal resources and consequences for those who opposed human bondage. enhance economic opportunity for the people of South Carolina. Comments regarding this or future issues of Coastal Heritage are welcomed at [email protected]. Subscriptions MEMORY ON THE MOVE are free upon request by contacting: The lowcountry, at last, is frankly addressing the realities of slavery in colonial and antebellum South Carolina. S.C. Sea Grant Consortium 287 Meeting Street 4 Charleston, S.C. 29401 phone: (843) 953-2078 NEWS AND NOTES e-mail: [email protected] • South Carolina students selected for Knauss fellowships Executive Director • Marine educator joins COSEE-SE M. Richard DeVoe • New Web portal for coastal officials launched • Consortium strategic plan available on Web Director of Communications Susan Ferris Hill 6 Editor EBBS AND FLOWS John H. Tibbetts • Ending the International Slave Trade: A Bicentenary Inquiry Art Director • Solutions to Coastal Disasters 2008 Carl Turner • Gullah/Geechee Nation International Music and Movement Festival Board of Directors ON THE COVER: The Consortium’s Board of Directors is This year, 2008, marks two centuries since the United States began its ban on the composed of the chief executive officers of its member institutions: importation of slaves.
    [Show full text]
  • Biculturalism and Identity in Contemporary Gullah Families
    BICULTURALISM AND IDENTITY IN CONTEMPORARY GULLAH FAMILIES by Peggy MacLeod Vogel Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in FAMILY AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT APPROVED: Janet K. Sawyers, Chairperson Katherine R. Allen Scott W. Johnson Dallas M. Johnson Michael J. Sporakowski February 25, 2000 Blacksburg, Virginia Key Words: Gullah, Family, Psychological, Bicultural, Symbolic Interaction, Identity Biculturalism and Identity in Contemporary Gullah Families Peggy MacLeod Vogel Abstract A qualitative study, using an oral history method was completed. Seven participants (2 men, 5 women) of Gullah descent from the St. Helena’s Island and Charleston, South Carolina area were extensively interviewed. Symbolic interactionism provided the theoretical framework for the study. Findings included the recognition of the Gullah as a unique cultural group and the possible effects of slavery on identity formation for individuals as well as the Gullah community. Striking differences in physical space utilization between Gullah and non-Gullah residents were suggested. The presence of conflict between African and European beliefs and practices were seen in areas such as religious traditions, child rearing, and language. The pervasive effect of racism on identity and its relationship to biculturalism was discussed. Biculturalism appeared to be strongly related to survival as well as being an integral part of the participants’ identities. ii Dedication To my children, Ricky Zimmermann Sarah Zimmermann Samantha Vogel Adam Vogel Philip Vogel Judy Pearman Wheeler To my husband, Mike Vogel To my parents, Norman and Isadore MacLeod To my brothers and sister, Alex MacLeod, Dan MacLeod and Lynn Strom To my godmother and her brother, Sybel Fellows and Charlie Fellows To my very best friends, Sandi Brenner, Judy Hoffman, Rebecca Lowry, Nancy McGee and Sue Stroman For all your sacrifice, love, and support, I dedicate this work to you.
    [Show full text]